


the devil's in the details

by worksofgies



Series: the story of you [3]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Domestic Violence, F/M, Mystery, POV Second Person, Realistic, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-02
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-06-02 23:26:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,558
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19451653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/worksofgies/pseuds/worksofgies
Summary: On your way back home, you happen to see a man and a woman up ahead. The rain obscures your vision, but when it finally clears, you don't like what you see.





	the devil's in the details

**Author's Note:**

> based on a virginian metaphor!  
> enjoy!

As your feet thud against the road, trees stretch overhead, shielding you from the water that lazily drips from their leaves. Light seems to break through, casting spots and shadows onto the cracked pavement as you make your way back home. The heat chokes you, but after a childhood of summers like this, it ain’t a shock to you. All you can do is grimace as the humidity glues your shirt to your back and sweat stains all of the clothes you wear. Rain can’t even be bothered to do its job properly on days like this, misting instead of the fat drops seen when it’s cool enough to form.

You turn the corner, and a pair of folks catch your eyes. They’re turned away from you in a hushed conversation, close to the edge of the forest on the Paganoni’s property line. There’s something about them that makes you uneasy, some sort of feeling they give off in the way they look that says you shouldn’t speak to them, and as the man grabs the woman by the arm, wrenching her into the shadows of the trees, you know that Paganoni doesn’t take kindly to intruders on his land. 

Water hits your shoulder, spreading along the thin cotton t-shirt and soaking you faster than you’d expect. Looking up at the sky, the light still shines, but the rain pours heavier than it had all summer, smacking against the pavement. In the distance, thunder rumbles, but there’s something else that’s caught your attention. A woman’s shriek, pitched higher than the Heavens, rings out, and chills you more than any water could.

Across the street, halfway hidden under shadows of oak and a half-dead dogwood, the woman stands, shoulders heaving as she whines. A smear of red stands stark against the skin of her cheek, as if she’d been wearing rouge like the women in town, but her face remains plain. Her hand reaches up, pulling her hair back and shaking as it feels the heat of the hit. 

“Ma’am?” Your voice sounds strange, quieter than you thought it would be. You raise it so she can hear over the patter of drops. “Ma’am, are you alright?”

It’s only then you realize that the man with her never left. He walks out without a care in the world, out from the treeline, and raises his hand, cracking it against her head again.

You can’t take it. Striding over to them, you hear a snatch of their argument.

“My momma isn’t gonna be happy to see me like this,” she says, voice wavering as she tries to sound like a threat. “She won’t let you come in to see me again.”

“I ain’t afraid of the elderly; your momma can’t do shit to me that I haven’t dealt with before.”

“I’ll call the sheriff, he’ll-”

“Andy won’t do anything.”

“I’ll-”

When you reach them, you lay a hand on the woman’s shoulder. “Ma’am,” you repeat, “do you need help?”

Without pause, the man yanks her out from your hold, dragging her to his side. “She’s fine,” he says, digging fingernails into the softness of her waist, pinching her skin through a yellow polka-dotted dress. “Leave us be.”

“Sir, I’m sorry, but I asked her, not you.” You try to meet the woman’s eyes, but she won’t turn away from the man, gaze anchored to the ground. “Ma’am?”

“She’s fine,” he repeats, and his voice growls as he says, “now, if you know what’s good for you, you’ll go home.”

“With all due respect, I ain’t leavin’ till I hear her say she’s okay. You shouldn’t be hittin’ a lady around like that.”

“I’ll do whatever I damn well please.” His hand creeps around to the woman’s back, sliding up until his hand disappears under her hair. She’s yanked back with brutal, unforgiving force, and they start off again. “We’ll be on our way.”

“Hey!” You run up, catching the man by the shoulder and pulling until he faces you. With all the force you can muster, you send your fist against his face, cracking against his cheekbone. A small part of you is glad he can feel how his woman felt when he did the same.

When he falls, feet slipping against the rain-slick road, he takes the woman down with him, falling on top of her body with a wicked thud. She cries out as she hits the asphalt, small bits of gravel working their way into her skin as it breaks against the sharp edges. The man pulls himself back, standing up to full height. 

You immediately duck down, hauling the woman up and propping her arm against your shoulder, and you pull her as far away as you can before the man turns to see.

When he sees you two, he smiles, dusting off the gravel stuck to his legs. His left arm is scratched up, presumably from the fall, and blood trickles from it. 

He smiles.

“Sir,” you say, “I’m taking her away from you.”

He stays silent, lip crooked upwards, and he walks away.

“Sir?”

“Let him leave,” a voice says, and you look down. The woman’s staring straight ahead, watching him as he skulks into the treeline. Together, you watch him until he’s out of sight, and when he’s gone, you look at her.

The road rash she got from the pavement stretches from a bruise near her brow to the bottom of her chin, sluggishly leaking out blood only to get washed away by the rain as it hits her head. Trickles of pink-tinted water fall, hitting her chest and rolling off. 

“I’d like to take you to my house,” you say. “I’ve got a first-aid kit there; I want to patch you up and I’m afraid your man might find you if we go to the hospital.”

She nods. “That’s kind of you.”

“I try my best, ma’am.” 

You walk in silence, half-carrying her as she limps on an ankle you think might be sprained, if not worse. The rain starts to abade, leaving heat rising as smoke from the pavement, and you breathe a sigh of relief knowing that your clothes might dry by the time you get back. When you see the cabin you call home up ahead, you tell her. 

You walk her up the steps, closing the mosquito-net enclosed porch door, but as you reach for your keys, your arm starts to itch. “Damn bugs,” you say, scratching your skin. “There must be a hole in the net.”

The woman looks at you, and when she sees your arm, her breath hitches. “Oh, honey,” she says, voice quiet, “I’m sorry.”

“What are you talking ‘bout? Ain’t nothing for you to be sorry for, miss.”

“I didn’t-,” she puts her uninjured hand on your bicep, “I didn’t see it earlier, I’m sorry.”

You stop scratching, and look at your arm, picking up her hand and moving it to get a clear look at it.

Burnt skin, bubbling at the edges, flakes off from where you’d touched it. It stretches from the middle of your upper arm to midway down your forearm, and, now that you think about it, you can feel the flesh of your shoulder pulled taut. It’s spreading.

“Please forgive me,” she says. “I didn’t see him do it, I’m sorry, I-”

She breaks, hiccuping cries as she skins to her knees, hands clasping at her ears as if she can block out your curses.

When your body thuds onto the wooden floorboards, when you convulse as the sickness spreads, as you feel every breath burn your lungs as if matches had been struck and thrown inside, all she can do is cry.

And, as your body stills, the rain begins to pour.

-

Miles away, Anna-Marie runs to her grandfather, pushing against the barnyard doors as she runs for cover. 

“What’s got you in a rush?” Fondness colors his voice as he smiles, seeing his granddaughter covered in mud and soaked to the bone.

“It started rainin’ when I was tryin’ to chase Stewart,” she says. He pulls her into his lap, grabbing a nearby towel and wiping her face down until it’s clean.

When he looks outside, the rain patters against the window and the sun shines through. “Looks like the Devil’s been beatin’ his wife,” he says, absentmindedly. 

Anna-Marie tugs on his shirtsleeve. “What does that mean?”

“Well,” he says, meeting his granddaughter’s questioning eyes, “when the sun shines, it makes the world hot.” At the girl’s nod, he continues, “and that heat is the Devil’s wife. She makes the world as hot as where she lives.”

“What about the rain?”

“That’s-,” he says, unsure of if she should hear the rest of the explanation, “that’s her tears.”

“Why’s she cryin’?”

“She’s gettin’ hurt, darlin’. The Devil ain’t a nice husband to have, and he doesn’t treat her well. He hurts her, and she cries.”

“Oh,” she says. After a moment of silence, she looks to her granddad once more. “Doesn’t anyone help her?”

“They try, darlin’, but the Devil is a tricky man. If anyone helped her, he’d be mad at ‘em and hurt them, too.”

His granddaughter pushes herself off of his lap, and squares her shoulders. Determined, she states. “if I ever see her, I’d try to help.”

“So would I, sweetheart.”

**Author's Note:**

> any settings/tropes you'd like to see next? any thoughts on what happened after? I'd love to hear them!


End file.
